


Ocean Eyes

by there_must_be_a_lock



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, Gratuitous ocean metaphors, Jared Padalecki's Eyes Work Literal Miracles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-01
Packaged: 2020-11-08 15:48:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20838056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/there_must_be_a_lock/pseuds/there_must_be_a_lock
Summary: "Don't let me sink."





	Ocean Eyes

She noticed the sweater before she was fully awake. 

She’d fallen asleep in the backseat of the Impala, curled up sideways with her knees tucked up to her chest. It had been warm that morning, but she wasn’t prepared for the chill of October in New England when the sun set and the temperature dropped rapidly; she had a vague memory of shivering, trying to huddle tighter against the seat, as she started to doze off somewhere around New Hampshire.

So she noticed the unexpected warmth, first. 

Then it was the scent. It was familiar, and so was the maddening twist of heat she felt, the gut-wrenching spike of _need_, followed by the certainty that everything was right in the world. It was a combination of sweet-safe-comfortable and _ohgodwant_ that only Sam could make her feel. 

She could never put her finger on what that smell was, exactly. She could never conjure it up in her memory when she was away from him, but no matter how long it had been since she’d seen him, the first hug had her inhaling deep and remembering: _right, of course, how could I forget?_ It was just _Sam_. That smell meant Sam, and Sam meant she was safe. 

She snuggled in deeper, rubbing her cheek on the soft fabric impulsively, before she’d even opened her eyes. 

Her sleepy brain was slow to put the pieces together, but she got there eventually. 

It must’ve been the dark charcoal-grey sweater he’d worn the previous day. It brought out the grey in his eyes; she remembered the way her stomach flipped when she saw him. They’d been working a case in a quiet seaside town in Maine. His eyes had looked steely, but they glinted gold at the edges when the light hit them right, just like the last rays of sun slanting through stormclouds and flashing off the distant ripples of the sea. She smiled at the memory. 

Someone snuffled and snorted in their sleep. 

She opened her eyes. Sam was the first thing she saw: sprawled out next to her with his cheek against the headrest, long limbs at awkward angles in the confines of the car, looking right back at her. He didn’t look away or try to pretend that he hadn’t been staring. Even in the dim not-quite-dawn light, she could see the strange, wild expression on his face, focused intently on her. It was the way he looked when they were in the final stages of solving a case, racing toward the conclusion. He was watching her like she was the last missing piece of a puzzle. 

“Morning,” she mumbled. She blinked, trying not to stare, but it was no use. He was too fucking beautiful to be real sometimes. 

“Sleep well?” he asked, quiet and hoarse. 

She nodded. “Thanks for the blanket.” 

“You needed to rest, after that fight. How’s your shoulder? Let me check it out?” 

She scooted over a little and he leaned in to meet her in the middle. She tilted her head to the side and kept her eyes on Dean, snoring in the driver’s seat. Cas was mirroring him on the passenger side. It was much safer to look at them than to acknowledge how close Sam was. 

His long fingers were careful and gentle as he tugged at her shirt, exposing the gauze-covered cut where her neck met her shoulder, and pulled up the corner of the bandage. She could feel his breath, just a feather-light tickle of warm air. She shivered. 

“Still cold?” Sam asked. 

She was still wrapped in his sweater. His proximity was making her feel overheated, if anything: a flush in her cheeks, a tingle starting low in her gut. 

“No.” 

Sam’s fingertips brushed ever so slightly over swollen skin as he smoothed the edges of the bandage back down. 

“Looks okay. We’ll wrap it better when we get home.” 

He wasn’t pulling away. He tugged her shirt back into place and then he was _touching_ her again, running his fingers gently down the side of her neck. His hand cupped her shoulder, his big palm curling around the curve of it, and his thumb rubbed a little circle, massaging the muscle there. Her breath caught in her throat. 

She went utterly still for a moment. It was nothing, or it _should’ve_ been nothing, nothing more than a sweet touch between friends, Sam taking care of her and grounding her and reassuring her as fucking always… but the simple pressure of his thumb under her collarbone was lighting every nerve ending in her body on fire. Her exhale was more like an uneven, shuddery sigh, mortifyingly loud in the close confines of the car. 

Sam snatched his hand away abruptly. 

The silence felt thick and hot. 

“I need some air,” she bit out, and she untangled herself from his sweater hastily, shoving it back onto the seat without looking at him. He made a little noise, an indistinct protest, but she was already fumbling for the door handle, easing it open as quietly as she could, clumsy with sleep and cramped muscles. 

The Impala was parked next to the ocean. Out over the water, where the sea met the sky, she could see the first hints of pink and lilac blossoming at the horizon, but almost everything else in her field of vision was a deep, monochromatic green-grey. The shore was a tumble of massive, weathered rocks, without any sort of welcoming bank that could be called a beach. A lone fisherman was silhouetted in the distance, perched at the end of a long jetty. Otherwise it was deserted: just some seagulls wheeling overhead in the sharp chilly breeze, and the car, and her. 

She stepped from the pavement to a boulder and started to pick her way down toward the water, hopping from crag to crag, stopping short of the slippery shine that marked the reach of the waves and their spray. There was a flat-enough stone there where she could stand without worrying about her balance. The wind was cutting right through her thin shirt. She wrapped her arms around herself and tried not to shiver. 

It was hard enough working with Sam and keeping her professional cool. Waking up next to that smile? _God_. This whole thing was just getting so pathetic, and that sigh might as well have been a moan. Her cheeks burned all over again as it replayed in her memory. 

The crashing waves covered the sound of his footsteps. By the time she heard and turned to look, he was close, stepping easily from one rock to the next where she’d had to jump and scramble to cover the distance. She turned her back to him and watched the sea, as if she could ever ignore him. 

She didn’t know what to say. It was a miracle he hadn’t realized, years ago, how she felt; it had to be written all over her face whenever she looked at him. It was inevitable, really, that he would figure it out eventually. Still, she wanted to squirm with embarrassment as she braced herself for the speech: _I don’t see you like that_… fuck. At least it’d be over soon. 

“I’m so sorry,” he said, barely audible under the sound of the water, and she turned just as he took the final step onto the rock. He found his footing and drew a deep breath. 

“What?” she blurted out. 

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. He grimaced. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have touched you like that. You must think I’m a fucking creep.” 

She stared at him blankly. 

He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and heaved a sigh. “I know you don’t feel the same way. I’m sorry, I crossed a line. I don’t ever want to make you uncomfortable.” 

She spluttered wordlessly for a moment and then laughed, too shocked to hold it back, loud enough that he let his hands drop and looked at her with his eyes wide like a kicked puppy. 

“You fucking _dumbass_,” she said. Her voice cracked. 

With one unsteady step, she closed the gap between them, throwing him off-balance and almost knocking them both over as she grabbed him by the front of his flannel and pulled him close. 

He was frozen in surprise for a moment. The first kiss was quick and clumsy, a barely-there brush of her mouth over his lower lip, exploring the curve of it, and it was just as soft as she’d always imagined. 

“Oh,” he breathed. 

Then his hands were pressing her closer, one at her waist, one cupping the back of her neck, and he was leaning down to kiss her properly, mouth hot and sure, hungry, fucking _desperate_, like maybe he’d been waiting for this, too. 

She’d thought her nerve endings were on fire earlier. That was _nothing_, compared to the blaze wherever he touched her now: his palm on her back, his fingers tangling in her hair, the planes of his chest where she was crushed against him, his teeth nipping at her lower lip, his slick tongue dipping and probing and tasting like he was ready to devour her. He was _everywhere_, filling her senses, igniting something that had been smoldering in her chest for too long. 

Her legs were shaking. She pulled away, just enough to suck in a breath, and almost stumbled when Sam took a half-step back too. His hand cradled her cheek, tilting her face up to meet his eyes; he looked shell-shocked. 

His smile came slow at first. She watched it spread, dimples tugging, bitten-red lips curling, until his whole face was just _glowing_ with it, with this pure sweet_ joy_, shining too bright to look at for long.

“Dumbass,” she repeated breathlessly. 

He traced her jaw with one gentle fingertip, still grinning, and nodded. “So I’ve been told.” 

Neither of them spoke for a moment. The earth was spinning on its axis in spite of the seismic shift in her world. A seagull shrieked overhead, waves crashed and receded, the salty breeze bit at any exposed skin, and none of it mattered. If the tide had come in, if water had risen up to her waist, she wouldn’t have noticed until she was being swept out to sea. 

She thought about legends of sirens and their songs, and for a moment she sympathized with the sailors. 

“Sun’s coming up,” he said. She was startled out of her reverie long enough to spare a glance at the horizon, where rays of pink and orange were lancing through the lightening sky and dancing off the waves, painting them in hues of pastel peach. 

Sam’s smile outshone any sunrise she would ever see. 

His eyes were sparkling, rippling with shades of green and blue and gold in the weak early-morning light, kaleidoscopic and dizzying. She could drown in those eyes, if she wasn’t careful. 

She stood on tiptoe for a kiss and he leaned into it, dipping her backwards, so that she would’ve fallen without his steady hands at her waist. Her head was spinning. 

“Don’t let me sink,” she whispered, and he kissed her again, long and sweet, before answering. 

“If we go down, we go down together.” 


End file.
